


cutting through the tape

by reliquiaen



Category: Yozakura Quartet
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-19
Updated: 2019-01-19
Packaged: 2019-10-12 16:43:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17471219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reliquiaen/pseuds/reliquiaen
Summary: hi i'm once again back writing fic for a show n ship i know nothing about! afaik this is post current canon feat. an enjin-free-gin bonding with workaholic murasaki so the senate can be sure he's not a threat. there's red tape, a bit of shared trauma, and late night dinners!





	cutting through the tape

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Xairathan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xairathan/gifts).



It's strange that even though he’s never worn glasses in his life – never needed them, rather, his eyesight is fine – there’s a flesh memory that thinks otherwise. Sometimes Gin will catch himself reaching up to adjust glasses that aren’t there and should have never been. He’ll pause mid-action and flinch at himself, and then of course, he’ll be painfully aware of how _empty_ his head feels.

There’s a part of him that misses Enjin, just a little. For the company… or not even that really, just the sense of not being alone. Not being himself, though, that he doesn’t miss in the least.

Gin scuffs the heels of his shoes against the pavement and shoves thoughts of Enjin forcefully away. That’s over with now. He’d watched that woman from the Senate stow them in a secure briefcase destined for who knows what. He’d cringed but given what had happened it had seemed fair.

Being handed a Senate approved baby-sitter, however, felt like an overreaction. So what if he understood why they were concerned? He was in full control of his faculties once again; a little trust might’ve been nice.

But this is the world he lives in. This one, that he hadn’t seen in years. He blinks at the passers-by; the man with the dog, the couple with a stroller, a pair of shrieking children waving popsicles as they chase each other around a tree. It’s… different. Unfamiliar. Sakura Shinmachi isn’t what he remembers through the hazy filter of Enjin’s control or the patchy memories of what he did. He. They. Whatever. It’s all the same in the Senate’s eyes and that’s what really matters in the end.

He’s supposed to be meeting his new _handler_ here: a public place, somewhere bad things are less likely to happen because no one wants to make a scene in front of children. Least of all Gin, not if he wants to be entrusted to his own liberty any time soon.

Stretching his legs out, heel of one shoe atop the toes of the other, he leans back against the bench and squints up at the sky. Gin met his babysitter just once, at the Senate meeting where they decided what was _safe_. Aka: what restrictions to put on him.

Don’t leave Sakura Shinmachi.

Don’t cause any youkai trouble.

Don’t mention Enjin.

That sort of thing. Most of the rest of their stipulations were silly things about his day to day life and interactions with humans (something the busybodies on the Senate council were _real_ forceful about, unsurprisingly).

He closes his eyes. His handler is late. Or maybe Gin has just forgotten what he looks like; they did meet only the one time, after all.

For a second, he considers opening his eyes to look around, but the Senate will have made sure the boy knows who he is. They won’t risk Gin being let off the leash too long and disappearing. The kid will recognise him.

His ears twitch when they catch the sound of approaching footsteps, but he doesn’t look around. Sure enough, a hand lands on his shoulder a few minutes later. He opens an eye and smiles.

“Murasaki, right?”

The hand pulls away from him as if burned and Murasaki shuffles his feet. “That’s right. And you’re Gin.”

There’s a sense of reverberation in the back of Gin’s head as he stands, echoes of thoughts pinging through Murasaki’s mind, but muffled. There’s a tinge of surprise, a quivering thread of uncertainty and a spark that Gin can only call determination. Murasaki’s shoulders tip back, no doubt a response to looking up; he’s a full head shorter than Gin, after all.

“You were at the Senate meeting,” Gin explains. Not that Murasaki has (or perhaps _would_ ask the question). “And the woman who released me from quarantine gave me your name when I asked.” He tilts his head, leans forward just slightly. “It was your technology that ascertained my new Enjin-free status.”

Murasaki sucks in a sharp breath through his teeth. “Yes,” he says, even though it wasn’t a question. “Don’t read my mind, Gin.”

“It’s already quite hard,” he replies, in lieu of an actual answer. “You have something to make it more difficult?”

He straightens the front of his coat, fiddles with the edge of the hood he has pulled up despite the fair weather. “Just in case.” Murasaki stuffs his hands into his pockets, probably to stop them from fidgeting. “Keep out of my head.”

Gin smiles at him. “Whatever you say. Now that you’ve arrived am I finally going to be free of the Senate’s watchers?” He tips his head in the direction of two well-dressed gentlemen doing their best not to look like the surveillance they are.

Murasaki follows his gaze but there’s little more than a compression to his lips as far as reactions go. Even the faint whispers of thoughts barely waver. Not that Gin goes out of his way to go rooting through them.

“They’re not here for you,” Murasaki says softly. “Come on. We have to talk.”

What a curious thing to say. The first bit, not the talking part, that makes complete sense. Gin looks over his shoulder at the two men once more before following Murasaki.

“Any reason we can’t talk here?”

Murasaki hunches a shoulder in a half-hearted shrug. “I don’t really like to be reminded of… what happened.”

And well… yeah. There’s not much to say to that. It’s completely understandable. It’s why Gin prefers the park to the busier parts of the area.

So he just nods and they walk in silence.

 

\--

 

And they sit in silence, too.

Murasaki has brought him to a bench overlooking the river. He sits kicking one foot under the seat and keeps his eyes fixed on the buildings rising above the other bank, completely ignoring Gin’s scrutiny of his profile. Neither of them has said a word since they got there.

A couple of times Gin has almost focused on Murasaki’s thoughts, wondering if he might find an avenue of conversation. It’s a temptation he resists. Even when the breeze catches on Murasaki’s hood and tips it over his shoulders to tousle his hair.

“Isn’t it funny,” Murasaki eventually whispers, “that people can _know_ something is happening, but not what or why?”

Gin’s lips quirk up into a smile. “Funny? I wouldn’t call it that.”

After a beat, Murasaki turns to look at him, gaze flicking between both of Gin’s eyes as if he thinks he’ll find something in one but not the other. Perhaps he’s looking for Enjin. “What would you call it?”

His ears twitch as he sighs. “Sad, I guess. After everything… Maybe bittersweet is better. They have no idea what’s coming and maybe that’s for the best.”

Murasaki’s still staring at him, weighing him up. Gin looks away.

“Would you rather not know?” Murasaki asks him.

It gets his attention again, at least. Gin opens his mouth, then closes it when his thoughts skitter away. Would he? What would have been different? What would it be like to not see such a huge thing coming?

He sighs again and shakes his head. “I don’t know. I don’t think so. And you?”

Murasaki’s mouth twists just slightly. “Ignorance is not always bliss.”

A cryptic answer if ever there was one. Gin smiles at him. “I suppose that’s true.” He hesitates, but now he’s thinking about it and the words fall out before he can actually stop them. “Do you know what they’ll do with Enjin?”

Something thrums unhappily in Murasaki’s mind but Gin refuses to look closer. The feeling still echoes through him, just the barest of brushes: worry. “No idea. It’s up to the Senate, I guess.”

Gin narrows his eyes, but without any proper thought searching there’s no way to be sure Murasaki is telling the truth (or lying). It’s not really any of his business at this point, either, but he still wants to know.

“Do you miss him?”

Something in Murasaki’s tone makes him relax. It’s… perhaps genuine surprise.

“Not… really. I don’t miss feeling cramped in my own head, shoved out of the way and forced to just… sleep through it all. I don’t miss the struggle of when I woke up and realised I wasn’t in control… But… without him…”

“It’s lonely,” Murasaki guesses. Not incorrectly, but he’s not entirely right either.

Gin shrugs, unsure he can fully articulate how it feels. He settles for, “It’s empty.”

Murasaki nods and they lapse back into silence, watching a ferry pass beneath a bridge.

 

\--

 

When Murasaki leaves him later (after learning where Gin has found accommodation, courtesy of the Senate) he says, “I have to go report on… today.”

“On me,” Gin corrects. “What are they having you do with me?”

He shrugs. “They just want to make sure you’re not a threat.”

Gin arches an eyebrow. “And the security?” He hasn’t seen the men in coats since the park but he’s not stupid.

Murasaki shakes his head. “They’re not for you.” The same words from earlier. He steps closer, not so close as to invade Gin’s space, but close enough to lower his voice. “If you need something and I’m not around just…”

Gin gives him a lopsided smile. “Summon you via thoughts?”

“Please, don’t do that.” Murasaki’s face scrunches up delightfully at the idea. Instead, he sticks his hand inside his coat and pulls out a piece of thick card that shimmers softly on one side. Looks like official Senate stationary. “Give that number a call instead.”

Gin turns the card over between his fingers but nothing about it changes. One side has a Senate crest embossed and the other has a single line of fine print – just a phone number.

He tucks it into his back pocket. “Alright.”

Murasaki steps back. But before he leaves altogether he says, “And stay out of trouble.”

Gin wonders what counts as _trouble_. Is Murasaki’s definition the same as the Senate’s?

 

\--

 

Murasaki turns up on his doorstep two days (hood up) later and without preamble says, “We should have standing appointments.”

Gin blinks but steps aside to let him in. “Are you my therapist now?”

He gets a withering look in return. “The Senate wants me to be more _thorough_ in my assessment of you.”

“Sounds like therapy to me.”

“Call it what you like, it’s a service to Sakura Shinmachi.” Even without reading his mind, Gin hears the implied ‘to make sure you’re not a threat’ that it carries.

Gin leads the way into his small apartment and sinks onto the cushions. He waits, watching while Murasaki shuffles and shifts, hesitating before folding himself down opposite Gin. Murasaki turns his gaze to the space, flitting about looking for any excuse not to return Gin’s studying.

Eventually the silence stretches too long, so Gin asks, “What sort of threat are they expecting me to pose?”

The way Murasaki’s expression sits when his eyes finally snap to Gin speak volumes. His fingers twitch together in his lap. “Enjin was… complicated, I guess. And well… no one has seen _you_ , Gin… the _real_ Gin in years. You’re…”

“An unknown factor.” He huffs. “Yeah.”

For a minute or two it’s Murasaki staring at Gin with his big eyes while Gin avoids looking at him in favour of staring at his sparse décor.

When Murasaki breaks it, he’s soft and surprising.

“I wasn’t born in Sakura Shinmachi,” he says, voice flat. “I don’t know anyone really outside the Senate. So… I get it.”

Gin’s brow creases gently. “The security? They’re for you?”

He shrugs. “They’re for… just in case. It’s not like the town has been a bastion of safety lately.”

“That’s partly my fault.”

“Buildings can be rebuilt.”

“But people can’t.”

Murasaki blinks at him, head tilting to one side. “No.” A pause. “When Enjin was in control, could you… see things? Did you know what he was doing?”

Gin looks away again and keeps his silence. Murasaki just waits. And he keeps waiting; this time when it snaps it’s because Murasaki is levering himself to his feet. He takes three steps away before he turns back just a little.

“If you want to talk…” He doesn’t bother finishing the offer. Perhaps he knows that Gin would rather not talk about Enjin or the damage he did.

But he’s not the satori and Gin doesn’t pry.

Murasaki lets himself out and when he’s gone Gin doesn’t feel any less alone.

 

\--

 

They meet once a week for about a month and they spend most of the time in silence. They sit on that bench by the river, outside a café Murasaki likes and once Gin simply woke up one morning to find him standing outside his building. Murasaki sometimes mentions his work for the Senate, sometimes a co-worker (or tells him about the café that he likes).

He never brings up Enjin again.

And Gin rarely speaks about what happened.

 

\--

 

It’s not enough.

 

\--

 

He wakes up in a cold sweat a few nights later to the feel of a building collapsing on his shoulders, of something dark and tacky pulling at him. Ears trembling, Gin takes several deep breaths and swings his legs out of bed so he can lean on his knees. It takes a moment but focusing on the soft pattering of rain against the window helps.

The dream fades slowly, slipping away in the manner of all dreams until he’s left with nothing but a vague sense of unease and a clenching feeling in his gut.

When he’s sure his legs will support him, Gin lurches to his feet and shuffles to the window, pushing back the curtains so he can see the blurry lights through the rain.

Through the glass, the world seems so very far away. Untouchable. His breath fogs up the pane keeping him a figurative arms-length from all the people out there in the twinkling of apartment windows and car headlamps and street lights.

Gin sucks in a deep breath and exhales slowly. Then repeats that a few times.

Then he calls Murasaki.

“It’s two in the morning, Gin,” is what he’s greeted with. Murasaki’s voice is thick, cracks a little around his name. “What’s so important?”

Gin takes in a final deep breath, feels his lungs expand all the way out, and on the exhale he says, “I’m standing outside looking in. Like those little glass balls with cities inside that you shake up to make it look like snow is falling. I watch the lives of others, I see how events unfold, but I’m never… invited in.”

On the other end of the line is first, static – the rustling of sheets as he sits up and the movement of Murasaki shifting the phone to the other ear – and second a soft thoughtful humming sound.

For a bit, they sit in silence. Same as they always do. The only sounds are the tap tapping of the rain and Murasaki’s breathing.

Then, “I came here for the Senate,” Murasaki tells him softly. “To work on my projects, develop the technology they needed to combat youkai powers when necessary, to _study_. So, I worked with these people who knew me, fought with them, and yet when they ask if I’d like to go grab something to eat it feels like a cursory gesture. They’re relieved when I decline because despite all of the rest, we don’t know each other, and I don’t belong with them.”

Gin barks a bitter laugh. “So much for bonding in the heat of things.”

Despite not invading Murasaki’s mental bubble, Gin can practically feel a dismissive shrug. “I’m not from around here.”

“A literal outsider.”

“And you,” Murasaki says around a mouthful of laughter, “A youkai the Senate worked against? Trying to fit into the peaceful life of Sakura Shinmachi?”

“Trying to remember what it’s like without darkness,” he mutters, half expecting Murasaki not to hear him.

He evidently does when he asks, “What’s it like? The other side?”

Gin takes a moment to collect his thoughts and eventually settles on, “Heavy. It’s like the night sky only without any stars, pressing down on you, pulling you. It wasn’t always, though.”

They fall to silence again, back to watching the rain slide down the glass.

“Do you think we can stop it?”

Murasaki’s voice is so small Gin thinks it should shatter.

His voice is equally fragile when he replies, “I hope so.”

 

\--

 

The next time Gin sees Murasaki he’s having a heated conversation with someone at the Senate building. In spite of the way curiosity starts violently gnawing on his insides, he refrains from eavesdropping. Instead, he stands off to one side and watches the people moving about, wondering if he’ll ever feel less detached from them.

He’s watching a man with a clipboard flip through pages and chewing on the end of his pen when Murasaki sidles up beside him.

“A visit during business hours,” Murasaki says, a faint trace of a smile on his face. For the first time since they met, he doesn’t have his hood pulled up. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“You mentioned the other night that you don’t, uh, leave the Senate unless it’s for a reason,” Gin says slowly. “I was wondering if I could perhaps tempt you into the sunshine for lunch?”

Murasaki blinks at him, a little dumbstruck, perhaps. “Alright. Let me grab my things.” He disappears through a side door and is back before Gin can properly go back to his people watching. When Murasaki falls into step beside him he says, “I didn’t figure you for a social caller.”

It takes him a moment to formulate a response to that since he’s not _really_ sure of the answer yet. But he looks over at Murasaki and words trip from his tongue all the same. “I was thinking about what you said the other night, about not really belonging here and I thought that, maybe, if the Senate really wants to be certain I’m not a threat then perhaps this is the time to find some common ground.”

The way Murasaki looks at him says it takes a moment for all that to parse properly but when he looks away there’s a gentle smile curving his lips.

“Like perhaps we could stand on the outside and look in together?” he asks as they exit the building and head down the street. Murasaki guides them, he almost always does: Gin has little knowledge of where things are in the city.

Gin smiles back. “Perhaps that exactly.”

Murasaki takes him down a couple of blocks and along one street towards the park, the location of his favourite outdoor restaurant Gin has learned. It’s just far enough away from the centre of town to not be overwhelmingly loud, but there’s enough noise to be a comfortable weight. To Gin anyway. He watches Murasaki select a table and order without looking at the menu and wonders if he feels the same way about noise or if it’s different for him.

Gin watches the few passers-by as they wait but Murasaki studies him with a careful gaze, his jaw working as he clearly debates speaking.

He does eventually. “I can’t stand being in the centre of town where the construction work is going on because the sounds are too loud.”

The implication behind that is easy enough for Gin to hear so he turns away from the street to look at Murasaki properly. “The other side was so oppressively quiet that loud noises here hurt my ears, but silence feels like a crushing weight on my chest.”

There’s a dark glimmer in Murasaki’s eyes that Gin recognises, he sees it every morning in the mirror: pain. And with that recognition comes a pang low in his ribs, not the tightly wound twinge he’s used to, but something warmer.

When Murasaki smiles, the shimmer in his eyes makes it look almost ironic. “I uh, haven’t even told any of my friends that, you know,” he whispers.

“Don’t worry,” Gin says, “your secret’s safe with me.”

And then the painful shine in his eyes fades and is replaced by something else. The warm tingle burns just a little brighter.

By the time their food is ready Murasaki looks a little less like the weight of the world is sitting on his shoulders, so Gin asks, “What _do_ you do with your time, then?”

And when Murasaki smiles and bursts into some science prattle about the technology he developed for the Senate there’s a different kind of spark behind his eyes. Gin knows that was the right thing to ask.

 

\--

 

Murasaki is passionate about his work. It’s one of the most endearing and ridiculous things Gin has ever learned about anyone. Mostly because Murasaki has been kind to him in the same way he’s kind to everyone. But he’s not very patient and when he gets a project stuck between his teeth, he worries it like a dog with a bone and he forgets that there are things beyond his workshop walls.

So Gin is not surprised in the least that when he gets a temporary visitor’s pass clipped to his coat and is pointed towards Murasaki’s workspace he finds the poor boy bleary eyed and half asleep over whatever he’s tinkering with. There are dark bags under his eyes and his hair is tousled in a way that screams ‘I haven’t slept in at least thirty hours and I skipped my last two meals’.

Murasaki doesn’t notice when Gin steps into the room. He blinks, and it takes several seconds for his eyes to open again; any longer and he would’ve been asleep.

He lifts the paper bag he brought with and shakes it gently. Murasaki reacts disproportionately to the rustling, starting so violently it’s a wonder he doesn’t fall off his seat.

“Gin?”

“I’m surprised you can recognise me,” he says with a laugh. “You look terrible.”

Murasaki speaks, but they’re not real words, just garbled sounds.

It just makes Gin laugh again, fondness crinkling the corners of his eyes as he sits on the single other stool in the room. “You can explain it to me after you’ve eaten and slept. Come on, that nice lady outside let me in only if I could coax you to go home and rest. She said you’ve been here for nearly four days.”

“Two and a bit!” Murasaki protests, but he’s got his nose in the top of the paper bag so it’s not _quite_ as indignant as he might have intended. He sighs happily when he realises Gin has brought his favourite ramen, in fact he very nearly hugs the bag to his chest. “Ohh, you’re the best, thanks, Gin.”

Slowly, so as not to alarm Murasaki, Gin puts his hand on top of the paper bag before he can get the food out. “Eat this, but then you’re coming with me.”

Murasaki blinks at him looking for all the world exactly like a dumb, confused baby owl. “Why? That’s so ominous.”

“Trust me.”

And Murasaki just smiles. “Okay.”

When faced with such a vague request, Gin suspects a normal person would eat at a normal speed. This is not what Murasaki does. He shovels food into his mouth at a speed Gin feels should make him ill. But then, he also doesn’t think Murasaki has eaten much in the last day or two so perhaps it’s fine.

Upon finishing, he drops the empty dish and cutlery back into the bag and lurches abruptly to his feet. “Alright. Let’s do this ominous thing of yours, then.”

“It’s hardly ominous, Murasaki,” Gin says as they head towards the exit. “I told you what it was.”

He blinks. “You did?”

“You’re clearly very tired.”

“I’m _exhausted_. I’ve been working for days on this.”

Gin gives him a sideways look and waves a thank you to the lady who had let him in. “Can I ask what it is? Or is it top secret?”

Murasaki waves a hand in a vague gesture. “It’s a sort of inhibitor tech to block youkai magic.”

He stops there but Gin just keeps waiting for him to continue and when they reach the end of that block he finally does, launching into a lot of jargon that Gin… doesn’t _fully_ get. But Murasaki looks so excited talking about how this will hopefully be able to protect more people from certain powers and how perhaps eventually it could be used during the construction of buildings to make them more resistant to some kinds of damage. He’s so enthusiastic about the whole concept that he doesn’t seem to even notice when he reaches his apartment, or even that he’s brought Gin with.

It’s dark out, the city lit only by street lamps and headlights, but the way those glimmers of brightness catch on Murasaki’s face as he stands on his stoop explaining the innermost designs of his current project make that flash of warmth from the other night curl once again just below Gin’s lungs. It’s bright and insistent and he doesn’t know what to do with it.

So instead, he takes Murasaki’s keys where they dangle – forgotten – from one finger and opens his front door.

“Sleep, Murasaki,” he says gently, pushing at his shoulder until he’s inside. He presses the keys back into Murasaki’s hand. “If you need me, just… think loudly. I can hear it.”

Murasaki’s teeth click together and he nods once, more seriously than the moment really requires. But it’s like as soon as he’s stopped speaking all the energy whooshes from him and he leans his weight on the door.

“Thanks again, Gin,” he says. “I’ll… see you later. I guess.”

“Of course. Sleep well.”

 

\--

 

Murasaki doesn’t immediately take him up on the offer of communicating via telepathy which Gin finds surprising just a little. But then, he does work for the Senate and his task with Gin is to ensure he’s not a threat, so maybe it’s not all that surprising with context.

When he does send a message, Gin isn’t expecting it. He’s sitting on his usual park bench, the remains of his lunch folded up beside him, just watching the world move around him. It’s been a quiet few days; he stopped by the Senate once after taking Murasaki home, but he had apparently taken the advice to heart and was sleeping off his work-a-thon.

So when he picks up a perhaps too loud, _Where are you_? he sits a little straighter.

 _The park_ , he projects back. _No need to think_ that _loudly. I can hear you_.

Now that he’s heard Murasaki’s thoughts directed at him he can feel the strange garble to his mind even from half way across town.

It’s another fifteen minutes before he spots Murasaki and even once he’s seated beside Gin (breathing heavily) he seems distracted. The emotion coiling in his head and heart is enough to make Gin’s ears twitch uncomfortably, but he doesn’t push for conversation. Sometimes, he’s learned, Murasaki must work himself up to it.

Eventually he mutters, “The Quartet wants to know what we’re doing with you. They’re apparently concerned that we’re going to do something drastic to you or Enjin.”

He waits but Murasaki doesn’t continue so Gin prompts, “And?”

“And well…” His hands flop dramatically against his lap. “They haven’t decided yet, I suppose. Enjin is being held in limbo and we’re not supposed to talk about it. My overseers are waiting on me to file a formal decision about _you_. It’s a mess.”

“It’s a bureaucracy. Of course it’s a mess.”

Murasaki huffs, threads of dissatisfaction whirling in with all the other emotional turmoil now. He looks at Gin with a frown. “Why aren’t you being more impatient?”

“Would that help you reach a conclusion faster?”

“No.”

“Then what’s the point?” He shrugs one shoulder and goes back to watching the civilians around them. “Nothing about me is going to change regardless.”

“But Enjin…”

Gin sucks in a sharp breath and fixes Murasaki with a look more intense than he intends. “What I did with Enjin in my head was out of my control. I remember little of it and what I do remember I have to reconcile myself. Or find a way to make amends. It…” He swallows and looks away again. “It hurts that when those people at the Senate look at me, when _you_ look at me, all you see is Enjin and what he did.”

His ears flick again under Murasaki’s scrutiny.

“Doesn’t it bother you?”

Gin’s shoulders slump. “Of course it does. How could it not? It wasn’t _me_ , but it _was_ at the same time. _I_ did those things, even if I wasn’t in control the whole time. How can I possibly make up for that?”

“Didn’t you go back to the other side to try and help?”

“Did it work?”

The _no_ hangs heavily between them for a moment and then Murasaki lays a hand on his knee. “Sometimes, your best has to be enough.” Then he stands and walks away.

Gin watches him go, ears drooping just a little, frown creasing his brow but Murasaki’s thoughts have calmed almost as if just talking had helped.

He wonders what it would be like if Murasaki had someone to talk to more often.

 

\--

 

 _I’m drowning in red tape_.

The thought interrupts Gin about two seconds before he falls asleep. He lies awake, waiting for more but for a long time there’s nothing else.

Just as he’s about to roll over and try for sleep again, he hears, _Ask me for my analysis and then question my word? Why ask in the first place then?_

The thoughts are bordering on irate which is unusual for Murasaki, so he sends back, _Are you alright_?

And there’s some of that typical garble in response. It takes a moment for Murasaki to collect his thoughts and Gin wonders if perhaps he’s in the middle of talking to someone else.

 _Fine. Just trying to sort out some filing. Hope I didn’t wake you_.

He laughs, projecting his amusement to Murasaki. _Not yet_.

_I’ll keep it down._

_Make sure you get some rest, Murasaki_.

A pause. Then, _Yes, Gin_. And after that Murasaki’s thoughts are muted again in the same way they were when they first met. He’s pulled his hood up to keep his thoughts from intruding.

How sweet.

Even without Murasaki’s thoughts, Gin finds it hard to embrace sleep after that.

 

\--

 

Gin finds a sealed letter on his doorstep the next morning bearing the Senate seal. Inside there’s a request for his attendance at the building that very afternoon.

He tries, but he can’t find Murasaki’s thoughts anywhere.

He heads to the park.

 

\--

 

That woman who’d let him in to see Murasaki a week ago greets him in the foyer. He should probably get her name at some point.

“This way, please,” she says, voice a little stiff, as she leads him away.

It’s not to Murasaki’s office she takes him, but it’s not (as he was dreading, deep down) to some official chamber where his fate would be sealed. Instead, it’s like a little meeting room. Murasaki is sitting on the far side of the table with his head tilted back against the chair, eyes closed. He’s the only one in the room.

The woman leaves him standing and when she pulls the door shut with a sharp snap on her way out, Murasaki jerks up. His hood falls off when he runs a hand through his already messy hair.

Which is perhaps a shame, because the thought, _Oh no, he looks so cute in that coat_ , is decidedly _not_ what Gin needs to focus.

Aloud he says, “What?”

Murasaki blinks. “What?”

That warmth is back again. In his ribs, oozing through his intestines, lighting up his face like a stop sign. He shakes his head and sits slowly opposite Murasaki. “Did you send me an official Senate summons?”

He gets a cheeky (if decidedly tired looking) grin. “Yeah. It’s official Senate business.” Then he pushes a thick stack of paper across the table.

Gin reads only the first few lines before looking up, wide-eyed, at Murasaki. “What is this?”

“Pardon documents and a blank slate of sorts for Sakura Shinmachi,” Murasaki says around a yawn. “You were right. People look at you and seen Enjin. So I figured it’s time to change that.”

“So… The Senate is pardoning me for what I did?”

Murasaki shrugs. “I told them some of what you told me. About how you feel responsible for what Enjin did even though you couldn’t stop him. They’ve decided that you’re two separate individuals and should be evaluated as such.”

Gin fingers the corner of the top page. “They needed you to tell them that, huh?”

He just smiles again. “Bureaucracies, right?”

At that, he actually laughs. When Gin stands and circles the table to pull him up in a tight hug it is apparently not what Murasaki was expecting.

He pulls away. “Look. You’re not the only one who’s done stuff here and lived to regret it,” he says softly. “A lot of what I’ve done has hurt people. I guess… I never stopped to consider that stopping the threat meant protecting the people too.” He fixes Gin with a sad smile. “I didn’t want you to be counted amongst the people I’ve hurt in the name of the greater good.”

Gin rubs his hands up Murasaki’s shoulders. “Maybe what you need is someone to help rebuild with, then. Not be alone in your office to the wee hours.”

When Murasaki smiles at him this time, it shines through the tired lines around his eyes and sets fire to whatever that warmth is bubbling away in his stomach. So Gin is _surprised_ (but not a whole lot) when he tips forward just close enough to press his lips to the corner of Murasaki’s mouth.

Even Murasaki doesn’t stay shocked and rigid for long.

When Gin leans away he says, “And you’re cute when you ramble.”

Murasaki goes bright red, but he’s still smiling.

Maybe what they both need is a chance to find where they fit. And when Gin threads his fingers through Murasaki’s and tugs him out of the room he can’t help but think that they fit pretty well.


End file.
